The Gluon

Gluons are elementary particles that act as the exchange particles (or gauge bosons) for the strong force between quarks, analogous to the exchange of photons in the electromagnetic force between two charged particles. In layman terms, they "glue" quarks together, forming protons and neutrons. In technical terms, gluons are vector gauge bosons that mediate strong interactions of quarks in quantum chromodynamics (QCD). Gluons themselves carry the color charge of the strong interaction. This is unlike the photon, which mediates the electromagnetic interaction but lacks an electric charge. Gluons therefore participate in the strong interaction in addition to mediating it, making QCD significantly harder to analyze than QED (quantum electrodynamics). This book gives a concise discussion of the current knowledge regarding the gluon and is designed to be a state of the art, superb academic reference work and provide an overview of the topic and give the reader a structured knowledge to familiarize yourself with the topic at the most affordable price possible. The accuracy and knowledge is of an international viewpoint as the edited articles represent the inputs of many knowledgeable individuals and some of the most current knowledge on the topic, based on the date of publication.